Today was about the three-hundred and ninety-second anniversary of the holiday we now popularly call Thanksgiving. Wherever you happen to be, and whatever your circumstance, I sincerely hope you have at least half the reasons for gratitude as I.
I spent most of today engaged in what has come to be a customary holiday activity for me. Whenever I am able to do so, I like to participate in a communal feeding event sponsored by a spiritual group I happen to be a member of. We do a big throw-down and feed a couple hundred folks, and it's something I always look forward to. It reminds me of nothing so much as the presbyterian covered-dish suppers I grew up with- my favorite aspect, by far, of church activity.
By about mid-afternoon I'd got myself back to my man-cave/crib, feeling grateful but quite satisfied that I'd served at least a portion of my daily karmic duty, and ready for some purely selfish time. That is to say, I decided to go for a quick walk. I've done three miles or so almost daily for several months now, and it's agreeing with me- (we'll see how long it lasts.....), but this was just intended to be a quickie, a few blocks- maybe a mile. It's a pretty cool place to walk- the historic Old Fourth Ward neighborhood near downtown Atlanta, and the adjecent area around Inman Park and Little Five Points. Good thing about that- like I said, I do it a lot these days.
Today the experience bordered on the surreal for me. Having recently survived an assorted variety of life-wrenching difficulties, and given a recent life-affirming visit with my sibs, the level of my spirit was back where I like it. This emotional atmosphere sort of melded, shortly into my stroll, with a radiant setting sun's long light, morphing into one of those extended deja-vooey things. Imagine, also, the audible sound of the absense of city traffic- a pulse city-dwellers become deaf to, until it's gone. In the heart of the 'hood, I heard the tinkling laughter of joyful kids and dogs barking- somehow unlike urban hounds, but rather, on closing my eyes for a minute, I found myself strolling at once along a street in rural carolina. Then suddenly I'm humbled by the history of the place, just around the corner from Reverend King's beginning and ending places, and the distant giggles turned a little ghostly.
But, saavy as I am to the perils of wandering the streets and byways of intown Atlanta with ones eyes shut like an old stoner imagining stuff, my reverie didn't last long, and by that time I was about home, anyway.
So now I sit writing and watching the Cowboys and Dolphins, feeling truly grateful and sooooo American. In a good way, of course. Happy Thanksgiving and thanks for the nut.
